I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ – Phil 1:6

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Niah National Park

Heading back to Hong Kong this coming Sunday. Class starts on Monday but I haven’t had the heart to decipher my new Surgery rotation timetable yet >< Why oh why.

I know if i don’t write this post in these few days, I will never ever get it done. But my electives to Sarawak is definitely worth reflecting upon and (hopefully) it will be useful to others out there planning to come to Southeast Asia for their electives!

Basically 4 of us classmates went together; Charlene from Sibu, Malaysia, while Florence and Judy from Hong Kong. Charlene and I were mainly out to see the working environment back in Malaysia and also some diseases that we would not/rarely see in Hong Kong. My HK friends were also interested to tour around the country.

We spent 3 weeks in Kuching (the capital city of Sarawak) and 1 week in Bintulu. We stopped by Miri over the weekend before we started our attachment in Bintulu Hospital. The pic below shows the map of Sarawak; it’s the largest state in the country and is located in East Malaysia.

Our trip was coordinated by Dr Wong Jin Shyan, who was previously working in Sarawak General and currently in Bintulu Hospital (but is moving back to SGH this coming Sept). He helped us a lot in our application, provided a place to stay for us in Bintulu and also letting us follow his ward rounds in the medical ward in Bintulu Hospital.

Travelling in Sarawak:

I realised that bringing overseas friends to Malaysia gave me an opportunity to utilise stuff I learned about Malaysian history back in my schooling days. James Brooke rang a bell; he had something to do with Sarawak but that’s all that I remember. dang. This photo was taken during our boat cruise along Sarawak River. The sunset was spectacular.

Bako! wonderful place for hikers.

The wild pig grew fond of mine and Judy’s trousers so we left the park with a muddy kiss on our legs xd (p.s. we took the trail T. Paku as you can see on the signboard)

we chose the shortest trail that took us 1.5 hours to get there; but it was only 0.8km! But it wasn’t an easy one given the steep and narrow trails and we were busy taking pictures all along the way. saw some of Sarawak’s famous proboscis monkeys but they were too high up in the trees it was hard to get a good shot of them.

there was a beach at the end of the trail Teluk Paku; teluk literally means gulf so it wasn’t a clear full view of the sea; but nice nevertheless. we didn’t manage to see the famous sea stacks though; to see that we would’ve had to take another trail that was 1.5 hours long/take a 35 ringgit boat to get there.

Semenggoh Wildlife Park where we saw around 6 orang utans. not really that worth it compared to the national parks (and maybe cause I have seen orangutans before xd)

Beach Republic in Miri. Thanks to Zhen Yu who took the effort to drive us all the way from Bintulu to Miri!

Our main purpose of going to Miri was actually to go Niah National Park. To see Gua Niah (niah caves) that was in our history textbooks about the earliest Stone Age settlers in Malaysia.

Unfortunately the painted caves (where we could see prehistoric carvings on the wall) was closed so we could only go to The Great Cave. which was already breathtaking by itself; my first time entering a cave; we bought headlights for 5 ringgit each at Supersave (a popular mart in Sarawak) and it served us well!

Charlene’s aunt took us to the beach at Bintulu. it’s funny how we went to three beaches in Sarawak but each having a totally different sunset =)

roti kahwin; (kahwin literally means marry; roti means bread) we have it in West Malaysia as well; ours just goes under the name of roti bakar. (bakar=toasted) Bread with kaya and butter dressing.

We also tried some local Iban food in a restaurant called D’yak. It’s just opposite The Spring, one of the major shopping malls in Kuching. the food was good but forgot what we ordered xd

This was their local wine i think. i have no idea how to comment on wines but it tasted a bit like plum wine to me and it wasn’t very strong. anyway i liked it =)

Sarawak laksa. Looked for it high and low and only managed to eat this twice throughout the month cause it would usually be sold out during lunch hours. but not as good as our penang asam laksa i think. maybe i’m just not eating at the right places

A popular place for seafood in Kuching would be Topspot. Apparently they say seafood is cheaper and more fresh here but i’m not a very money savvy kind of person so i cant tell @@ but i find pandamaran klang seafood better hee =)

prawn with cornflakes topping or something like that.

I realised I have never really tried much foochow food! this is fried pai guo gan （炒白果干）which tastes similar to char koay teow except that they use a different kind of noodle. had it in the food court in The Spring.

There are lots of SCR Singapore Chicken Rice restaurants here in Sarawak; i have no idea why. But their chicken rice is good!

Kolo Mee, another Sarawak delicacy. Tastes similar to wan tan mee but using maggi mee-type noodles.

Had some Indian food too. Here is some Naan from Tandoori Palace located in Kuching Town. The curry was good =)

daily murmurs

Love

The love for equals is a human thing - of friend for friend, brother for brother. It is to love what is loving and lovely, the world smiles.

The love for the less fortunate is a beautiful thing - the love for those who suffer, for those who are poor, the sick, the failures, the unlovely. This is compassion, and it touches the heart of the world.

The love for the more fortunate is a rare thing - to love those who succeed where we fail, to rejoice without envy with those who rejoice, the love of the poor for the rich, of the black man for the white man. The world is always bewildered by its saints.

And then there is the love for the enemy - love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world.

~ Frederick Buechner, The Magnificent Defeat

for those who wander

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,

From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean--roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin--his control
Stops with the shore;--upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man’s ravage, save his own,
When for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.

His steps are not upon thy paths,--thy fields
Are not a spoil for him,--thou dost arise
And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields
For earth’s destruction thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send’st him, shivering in thy playful spray
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth: —there let him lay.
~ Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

Not till we are completely lost or turned around... do we begin to find ourselves.
~ Henry David Thoreau